How many pixels do we really need?

[roydonian]

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On 12/6/2023 at 7:47 AM, mfunnell said:

I know I'm way, way, late to this topic, but from playing around with printing for display and as a very rough approximation, I worked out that all else being equal (which it seldom is) you can easily produce a good A4-size print from a 3mp image and with care can often "get away with" 2mp.

I can remember seeing an article in the UK magazine 'Amateur Photographer' about 20 years ago stating that that 6 megapixels was all that most users would need.

 

 

[pgk]

6 minutes ago, roydonian said:

I can remember seeing an article in the UK magazine 'Amateur Photographer' about 20 years ago stating that that 6 megapixels was all that most users would need.

There is a big difference between need and want.

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[anonymoose]

8 hours ago, pgk said:

What were perfectly good prints back then are still perfectly good prints now. Printing technology has changed but in terms of detail and resolution a 10x8 viewed 'correctly' will be no better now than then.

I am printing 8x10s from a 12MP camera (A7S III) and a 47MP camera (Leica Q2) at home, minutes apart, and see a noticeable difference in detail on these prints. Your observations from 40 years ago don't change that in the slightest.

Edited January 6 by anonymoose

[pgk]

56 minutes ago, anonymoose said:

Your observations from 40 years ago don't change that in the slightest.

I never said they did. Reread my original comment.

[anonymoose]

1 hour ago, pgk said:

I never said they did. Reread my original comment.

There's nothing wrong with the A7S III. You should print your own 8x10 images from two modern cameras and see the difference for yourself instead of making assumptions because of something you tested 40 years ago.

Edited January 6 by anonymoose

[pgk]

11 minutes ago, anonymoose said:

There's nothing wrong with the A7S III. You should print your own 8x10 images from two modern cameras and see the difference for yourself instead of making assumptions because of something you tested 40 years ago.

You are assuming that I don't. Assumptions are problematic.

[anonymoose]

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42 minutes ago, pgk said:

You are assuming that I don't. Assumptions are problematic.

If you do, you shouldn't open your dissent with "I did this 40 years ago..."

If you do, you should also be able to see a difference with 4x the capture resolution assuming you have 20/20 vision (corrected or otherwise).

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On 12/6/2023 at 8:47 AM, mfunnell said:

, but from playing around with printing for display and as a very rough approximation, I worked out that all else being equal (which it seldom is) you can easily produce a good A4-size print from a 3mp image and with care can often "get away with" 2mp.

I agree. Actually, it's simple arithmetic. My dye-transfer printer from a few decades ago made gorgeous prints on A4 with about 200 pixels per inch. However, these were real pixels and not the dithered ones produced by ink jet printers. My 2MP Canon was quite sufficient for that, as long as you didn't crop your pictures at all. The least amount of cropping severely limited your options.

 

[Lax Jought]

18-24MP is the sweet spot for me.  

If I was a commercial photographer with clients who need larger prints, then I'd need a Hasselblad or other medium format camera that'll give me the quality in a larger print. 

I quite liked the Sony approach when they released their three A7 editions - the regular A7, the A7R for people who want the higher res, and the A7S which is a lot more what I'm after - a sensor with a smaller megapixel count (12MP) but compensated with larger photosites that can handle the craziest low light situations. That's the one for me. 

[pgk]

12 hours ago, anonymoose said:

If you do, you shouldn't open your dissent with "I did this 40 years ago..."

If you do, you should also be able to see a difference with 4x the capture resolution assuming you have 20/20 vision (corrected or otherwise).

The comparison I did 40 years ago was shooting identical scenes and using MTF testing equipment which I cannot do any longer. - it was a scientific check based on 10x8 which was the print size which was considered suitable for 35mm checks. Today I check lenses by shooting identical images. But a 10x8 print does not test the resolutions that you are suggesting will show differences due to sensor pixel numbers as 10MPixels will produce a perfectly good print and downscaling larger introduces more variables via software. 

[M11 for me]

The thread gets a bit a sad turn. The TO @dennersten made an interesting statement about the upcoming of AI in lightroom classic. And indeed this is interesting and what impact this could have on sensor resolution that we "need"? We can do both now (or is this really true?): We can crop and at the same time produce higher resolution images. To me its not about the question if 3MP are enough for what size. I know for sure that higher resolution makes a visible difference. Otherwise there woud be no 60Mpix cameras or Hasselblad cameras with bigger sensors plus higher resolution. There is more visible detail in an image and this is part of the progress in building modern sensors. And that is fully ok to me. One can still buy very modern cameras with "low" res sensors if needed. See SL2-S. And its not about Rembrandt copies as posted above either. Its about real life use cases. I was on the web-site of @dennersten and I am impressed about his work as an artist and photographer. His initial question seems to me to be very important. Its not about viewing distance at an exhibition: Everybody knows that in an art museum you do not just look a a painting from the distance. I like as well to see the rechnique from very near. The same is true with a photograph: I like to see the details. 

I just read an excellent book in german: Der Wanderfotograf from Mario Casella; its about the very difficult life of the photographer Roberto Donetta. Its most interesting to learn how he worked over 1 century ago. I do not expect sharp images. The technique did not allow for something better. But today we have different equipment. And as a hobby fotographer I apreciate that a lot. 

[fotomas]

24

[pgk]

49 minutes ago, M11 for me said:

I just read an excellent book in german: Der Wanderfotograf from Mario Casella; its about the very difficult life of the photographer Roberto Donetta. Its most interesting to learn how he worked over 1 century ago. I do not expect sharp images. The technique did not allow for something better. But today we have different equipment.

I think that you underestimate the abilities and equipment from the past. Here is an except from an article I had published last year illustrated with images taken on an 1865 lens. Photographic images taken in the past were often taken with a great deal more technical care than they are today. Having been commissioned to reproduce some I can say that the photographers who took the originals were very competent. The ease of modern technology and its ability to create apparently good images technically can be very misleading.

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[M11 for me]

Indeed, you are right. I was not aware of that. Thank you for that.

But I doubt that the above image was exposed for 4 seconds like it had to be done in 1900 when using glass plates 🫠

Edited January 7 by M11 for me

[willeica]

10 hours ago, pgk said:

I think that you underestimate the abilities and equipment from the past. Here is an except from an article I had published last year illustrated with images taken on an 1865 lens. Photographic images taken in the past were often taken with a great deal more technical care than they are today. Having been commissioned to reproduce some I can say that the photographers who took the originals were very competent. The ease of modern technology and its ability to create apparently good images technically can be very misleading.

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Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

Nice images, Paul. Those Dublin made lenses (I have 10 of them and you have more) were well ahead of the game in the mid 19th Century and still work on today's cameras. The first viable submarine was also created by an Irishman https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Philip_Holland and the Holland submarine design he supplied to the Royal Navy also had periscopes made in Dublin by the same firm which made your lens http://rnsubs.co.uk/articles/development/periscopes.html . So you are keeping a great tradition alive. 

10 hours ago, M11 for me said:

But I doubt that the above image was exposed for 4 seconds like it had to be done in 1900 when using glass plates

I'd love to tell you that the lenses had in-built image stabilisation, but that would not be true 😇. Paul (pgk) has a great story from his time in RG Lewis about a test for an underwater housing for Leicas where everyone decamped to the coast of Dorset and one of the RG Lewis staff marched into the sea, in a frogman suit, with a Leica in a new underwater housing design, while management stood on the beach and took notes. The housing kept the camera dry, but they did not take photos. In the event it turned out that getting good photos with that housing was not easy. The underwater housings did not sell very well and, as a result, they have now become very expensive collectors' items. 

For the photo above, Paul had to use fixed focus and fixed aperture, so getting good photos, while easier than it would have been 160 years ago, was not an easy task. Underwater housings have improved a lot even since WWII. I was recently asked whether this device from the 1950s could have been used with a Leica camera, but I am in Ireland and the device is in Germany and so I could not give definitive advice. I felt that as the device was from France, a FOCA camera might have been used.

 

Underwater cameras became much easier to use, than what is shown above, after the advent of the Calypso/Nikonos and Paul can advise about the possibilities with modern underwater housings. I admire what Paul has done here with a fixed focus lens, uncoated with just two elements cemented together, a washer stop for aperture and no other controls. I am going to send Paul's images to Peter Karbe to see what he thinks. 

William 

Edited January 8 by willeica

[Einst_Stein]

On 10/30/2023 at 1:54 PM, dennersten said:

I am an art photographer. Landscape and nature mostly. I am doing art, books, posters, etc. 

I am sitting and working on my upcoming exhibition in Stockholm. Two pictures are from the M9 (the rest from M11). I am sitting with the 18 mp images in Lightroom Classic; right-click and choose enhance. And Poff, they are 72 mp. I edit and crop them and print them to 70cm x 100cm.

In the last exhibition, I sold nine M9 pictures for 500 - 1000 Euro a piece. So my audience liked them also. 

So the question is: How many pixels do we need in these AI days? Is the pixel race over? 

From image quality point of view, in the final image (cropped or not), 18MP is enough.

From marketing point of view, 24MP is more than enough, but easier to sell than 18MP. 

 

  

[Einst_Stein]

Recently I visited Ansel Adams Gallery in Yosemite, where I saw all darkroom printed pictures directly from films (with printed Ansel's signature) are limited to 14x11 (or is it 8x10? sorry I didn't rmember it precisely). It was requested by Ansel Adams. Only digital scanned (after prints) are allowed to be larger.

Figurte out how many MP it is!

[Hans-Dieter Gülicher]

I am happy with my DMR-pictures taken 2005 - 2011 up to day. They based on 10 MP, only. But it is a very special feeling to see what has happend at that time.

And to to day: My M 10-R = 40 MP, my S3 64 MP.

[pgk]

8 hours ago, Einst_Stein said:

From image quality point of view, in the final image (cropped or not), 18MP is enough.

From marketing point of view, 24MP is more than enough, but easier to sell than 18MP. 

I think that 24MP is a 'sweet spot' although most of my photographs are taken on M9s ...... I do have a camera with 40+MP but it is, by far, the least used.

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[pgk]

8 hours ago, Einst_Stein said:

Recently I visited Ansel Adams Gallery in Yosemite, where I saw all darkroom printed pictures directly from films (with printed Ansel's signature) are limited to 14x11 (or is it 8x10? sorry I didn't rmember it precisely). It was requested by Ansel Adams. Only digital scanned (after prints) are allowed to be larger.

Figurte out how many MP it is!

There was an AA exhibition at the National Maritime Museum with many very large prints. I'm pretty sure that most were original darkroom prints as only a few were described as being 'made for the exhibition'.